Till We're Over
by hghrules
Summary: *third book of the IBMEC (I Blame My Evil Clone) trilogy* "But if you think we're going to give up, you're wrong. We will fight until this entire event is over and done with, 'till we ourselves are over and done with. We will never give up. Never."
1. Prologue

**'Till We're Over**

**Chapter 0: Prologue**

**Sky's POV**

"This alarms me greatly!" I holler.

Silence. Nothing but silence.

"Ahh, this is terrifying!" I shout before pausing, waiting for some kind of response and frowning when I don't get one. "Uh, guys? You got me. Congrats! Now hurry up and cut it out."

They don't stop. Those creepy smiles stay on their faces. Their bodies remain rigidly straight.

"I really, truly appreciate this prank thing," I tell them, but I might as well be speaking to a bunch of inanimate objects, because they don't move a muscle. I continue anyways. "It made me smile. I laughed at the beginning. It helped me forget E-Ty for a moment. But now you are legitimately scaring me, s-so please stop."

Jason's grin stretches. Mitch tightens his grip on his sword, which is held stock-still in front of him. Ian blinks, smirks.

Ty tilts his head, staring at me. "I don't want to stop," he mutters, frowning. "We don't want to stop."

The whole Team frowns at me, and I bite my lip out of fear. "G-Guys, this isn't funny. This stopped being funny several minutes ago."

"Maybe it's not meant to be funny," Jason suggests. "Maybe it's supposed to be serious."

Jason and Ty step forward. Both wield emerald swords, and the sickening smiles have returned to their faces. "Oh, Notch," I mumble. "This has to be a dream. This can't be real."

"Oh, it's real," Seto assures me, stepping up to stand between Jason and Ty. "Nothing has ever been more so."

I take a small step backward, away from my line of friends, only to find that the door I came through has fallen away into nonexistence. My back presses against the black wall that should be budder-colored, and my heart races in my chest.

I don't know why I'm panicking so much. They're just kidding. They're just trying to scare me. They're just joking.

Maybe it's the pure darkness that has now overtaken the room. Maybe it's the blank, soulless look in my friends' eyes. Maybe it's the deafening silence that causes my breath to quicken and my heart to pound.

Maybe it's the other me, the one grinning far too kindly as he steps from behind my friends and thanks me for giving him his second chance.


	2. Ch 1: Pressure

_*sobs* I wrote this on the five-hour car drive this weekend, but as soon as we got to the place, the frickin computer crashed and turned my entire freaking chapter to hashtags D: I mean, I love hashtags, but not nearly that much._

_So, *deep breath* I rewrote it. I think it turned out okay, maybe even better than the original, so whatever._

_En-juh-hoy, my be-ay-yoo-tiful Rulers!_

**Chapter One: Pressure**

**Time: thirty minutes before**

**Place: a crappy jump map**

**Ty's POV**

"Jason, I swear, if you kill me one more time- _Jason_!"

Jason leans over, laughing so hard that it almost looks painful, as I respawn for the millionth time today. Seeing as I haven't got any weapons or armor anymore, really the only thing I can do in return is glare and refuse to talk to the boy. "Hmph."

"Aw, come on, Ty!" Jason calls, trying to hide the rest of his laughter. "You can teleport to me!"

"I hate you."

"Heh. That's okay."

I groan. "Why did I even agree to do this stupid jump map in the first place?" I ask the air as I plop down on the starting platform.

"Uh, because Sky tied us up to a couple of chairs and threatened to feed us to the squids if we didn't," Jason reminds me, and I roll my eyes. That was a rhetorical question, dummy.

I huff. "Sky isn't even here! What kind of idiot puts time and energy into forcing his two best friends to play a map only to fail to show up himself?"

Jason shrugs. "I dunno. Hashtag Truelox?"

I chuckle. "Nah, Sky ships Skylox too much for that."

He shrugs again. "... Well, Skyloxuniver-"

"I am not talking to you anymore," I say, effectively cutting him off as I stand and turn toward the map's exit door. "Where do you think Sky is?"

"I thought you weren't talking to me any-"

"Ugh, fine. I'm talking to you again, now answer the question."

Jason chuckles. "My guess is that he's either mining budder or hunting squids. Or possibly just terrorizing one of our friends."

I snort. "... Actually, that's entirely plausible." Jason teleports to my side, and we walk out of the map together. "I'm gonna go check his house. Can you look in the budder mines?"

"Can't we at least try to call him first?"

"Oh. Yeah, that would probably be smart," I reply, stopping. Jason tugs his phone out of his pocket and immediately dials Sky's number. A minute or two of obnoxious ringing later, Sky's recorded voice blares through the speakers.

"AHH, NO, PLEASE, NO! FOR THE LOVE OF BUDDER, HAVE MERCY! ACK! I'M SORRY, WHOEVER IS CALLING ME, BUT I'M CURRENTLY RUNNING FROM A BUNCH OF – AHH! - SQUIDS, CALL ME BACK LATER!"

After a few seconds of complete silence, Jason and I burst out laughing in scary synchronization. "Oh my gosh," I gasp, "he's such a dork!"

Jason nods, still giggling. "Can we just talk about his acting skills, though? Like, I can't even count how many times I've sprinted all the way to his house just to make sure he was kidding."

"Twenty-Seven."

"What?"

"Twenty-Seven. That's how many times you've dropped everything you were doing to go ensure that Sky wasn't dead."

"No way! That can't possibly be-"

"In this week alone."

"Ah, that makes more sense."

That sparks another fit of laughter, but after a good three minutes of relearning how to breathe, we're finally on our way to Seto's house. Seto is always the first person we go to when we lose Sky, because Seto actually put a tracker in the budder-loving fool's glasses (which he still wears constantly despite not having to hide his eyes anymore) a while ago after he had gone missing ten times in one week. Of course, now that the whole Red Eyes deal is history, Sky could just die and respawn back at home, but Sky would never kill himself for that reason. First of all, there's a bit of trauma about Red Eyes and death that he can't quite get over, but there's also the fact that he doesn't want to lose all the budder that he hides in the back of his inventory. Sky either finds his way home on his own, is found by one of his friends, or simply lives in the middle of the wilderness for all of eternity.

Yeah. He's a bit stubborn.

I pound my fists against Seto's front door impatiently (this is how we always summon Seto, because it often causes him to lose his focus and screw up a spell, which causes him to march up the stairs and glare at us as he flings open the door, which causes us to be amused). "Ack! No!" a voice calls faintly from the direction of the basement, and Jason and I snicker. Then a loud sigh reaches our ears, and soon Seto is tiredly opening the door and shooting us a hostile glare. "What do you guys want?"

"We lost Sky again, and we need you to help us find him," I explain, leading Jason inside. I jump onto the couch and stare expectantly at Seto, waiting for him to do his magicky thingy.

"What? That's like the twenty-seventh time this month!"

"Twenty-eighth, actually."

He sighs again. "Right, whatever. You're all idiots." He lifts his hands the slightest bit, and a transparent orb made of purple wisps of magic forms around each of them. The magic begins to float away from his hands and into the air.

Seto stops.

Confused by the abrupt pause in the spell, I tilt my head to the right a little and stare up at Seto's slightly troubled expression. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"O-Oh," Seto begins, looking distracted. "It's nothing. It's just, I- uh, well, I felt something in the air... Almost like the world was too packed? There's this unwanted pressure in the atmosphere, like there's more on this earth than there was a few seconds ago."

I shrug. "Maybe someone spawned a kid or something."

Seto bites his lip, shakes his head. "No, no, it's not that. See, when someone spawns an animal or another human, the matter used to create it is taken from an unused part of the earth. That keeps the earth's mass steady, it keeps the world from getting too packed. So it can't be that."

Jason puffs up his cheeks with air. "Uh, maybe Notch recently updated the world? Maybe he added a new block. That would affect the mass and matter stuff, right?"

Seto considers this for a moment. Finally, he nods and puts his hands up again. "Maybe. That must be it." The purple swirls around his hands.

He stops again.

He breathes out slowly, shaking his head one more time. "No, it's- it's something else. I've felt it before, I know I have- I just don't know _when_ or _why_. I only wish I had stopped to figure out what this pressure was last time I felt it... I can't do it now, t-too tired for that spell... Notch dang it."

"Wait, you've felt it before?" Jason asks. Seto nods. "Well, the world didn't explode_ then_, did it? We're still here, so clearly nothing bad came of this weird 'pressure.' Just ignore it and go on with life."

Seto thinks about this for a second and then shrugs. "I-I guess... Yeah, I guess you're right." He raises his hands, the purple orbs materialize, and I wait for Seto to pause again. He doesn't though, keeps right on going, and the magic rises into the air and forms a wispy square. Seto reaches out and tugs on the side of the square, planning to open it and look through it like a window just as he always does.

He frowns. "It's- Is it stuck?"

Jason's and my eyes widen. "Oh, no," I whisper.

Seto pulls harder, and a few seconds later, the window flies open, revealing Sky wandering around the city and asking where the heck the city gates are. Jason and I are in hysterics, laughing insanely about how we were about to freak out about nothing more than Sky getting lost in the crowded city.

A familiar hand is raised above the crowd, and soon Mitch is making his way to Sky and directing him towards the gates. Sky thanks him profusely and then darts off, probably flipping out about being late for the jump map.

Seto glares at us. "You didn't even check the city?"

I shrug, smiling apologetically. "Sorry, we're lazy."

He sighs. "Yes, yes, you are. I'm going to go take a nap – that spell took a lot more out of me than usual, but, then again, I've been more tired lately. I think I need to stop staying up so late. Have fun at the map!"

"Oh, we are _not_ playing that map again," I growl, walking out the door and waiting for Jason to follow. "Have a nice nap, though!"

Seto nods tiredly in acknowledgment and then waves as he heads back downstairs, and I close the door gently after Jason steps outside. "Ready to go meet Sky?" I ask him.

He nods, imitating Mario as he replies with, "Let's-a go!"


	3. Ch 2: I'LL BE THERE FOR YOUUUU

**Chapter Two: I'LL BE THERE FOR YOUUUU**

**Time: three minutes and eight seconds later (in relation to the last chapter)**

**Place: outside the jump map**

**Ty's POV**

"SKY!" I scream. "WHERE THE HECK ARE YOU!?"

Jason rolls his eyes. "Ty, that's not gonna work. If he's nearby, we wouldn't need to scream, but if he's not nearby, then he won't hear us screaming. Either way, it's pointless."

I huff. "Well, what are we supposed to do?"

"I dunno, maybe we can go back to Seto's house and ask him to do the spell again."

"No, no. He said he was super tired, I don't want to disturb him again. He wasn't exactly the happiest sorcerer after we realized Sky was just in the city."

"Yeah, but now we know that Sky _isn't_ just in the city. At least, not anymore."

"Right. That seems to be an issue."

Jason hits his forehead with his palm and then drags his hand slowly down his face. "You... are an idiot."

I frown. "Hey, aren't you usually moderately optimistic and happy? You're acting like me right now."

"Ow, big words."

"And that was something Sky would say!"

"I need to have more alone time."

"Probably."

…

"Whoa, hey, Sky!" I realize as my eyes widen.

"Right, right! I almost forgot about him!" Jason says, nodding his head.

"Well, if he's not in the city, and he's not at his house, mine, or yours, and he's not here at the jump map – well, where else would he be? He said he'd do the jump map with us, so shouldn't he be somewhere we'd be?" I ask, furrowing my eyebrows.

"I don't know, I mean- you'd think. But Sky is weird, he's probably half-way across the world."

I sigh. "Sadly, Sky is so stupid that that idea is actually plausible. Uh, but maybe one of the paopeoap dklf jfi di di iwjnot know how I was wwriting witho;ut watchin htek eyboard or thinking of my words, I just ranomly picked words and wrote them dow because writer's block also I did not proofread this paragraph because why freaking not im watching friends "I feel terrible, im a horrible rible rible person," said chandler. "I'm sorry what" said Rachel becaue this is the cheesecake episode and I love this omg it's so cool this is what happens when Hannah gets writers block rawr ugh "I'LL BE THERE FOR YOU, CAUSE YOURE THERE FOR ME TOOOO- OOOOH"

I sigh. "Sadly, Sky is so stupid that that idea is actually plausible. Uh, but maybe one of our other friends knows where he is? Then we wouldn't have to bother Seto."

"Mm, that's a good idea. You call the Ssunkipz and I'll call Merome?" Jason asks.

I nod and pull out my cellphone, quickly dialing Ian's number. "Hey, Derp, where are you?"

Ian's voice growls through the phone, "I am _not_ a derp, it's a con_dition_!"

I roll my eyes. "Right, uh-huh, whatever. Where are you?"

"Quentin and I are at that underwater cave he found, we're making normal cake. He says my cake is weird."

"Oh, it is." He sighs. "Is Sky there?"

"No, sorry," Ian replies.

"Dang it," I mutter. "Do you or the fish have any idea where he is?"

"I'm not a fish, I'm an _amphibian!"_ calls a faint voice.

"Uh, no, we don't know where he is," Ian says, seeming distracted. Then I hear him say, in a voice that sounds farther away from the phone, "Fish, calm down, just focus on stirring the batter or whatever."

Quentin starts yelling, so I mumble a goodbye and hang up.

"Any luck with those two?" Jason asks, sliding his phone back into his pocket.

"Nope," I sigh. "How about the Merome?"

"No luck there, either," Jason sighs. "What about- uh, let's just try calling Sky again?"

Three minutes later, we're listening to his voice mail machine. "JASON AND TY, IF THIS IS YOU, PLEASE KNOW THAT I AM EXTREMELY SORRY FOR MISSING THE JUMP MAP AND ALSO SQUIDS ARE MURDERING ME BRUTALLY... WITH SPOONS, SO PLEASE EXCUSE MY FORGETFULNESS."

I sigh. Jason does, too. Like, at the exact same time.

We exchange a glance.

"You know, it's getting creepy-" I start.

"I know, I know," Jason says hurriedly. "Don't think about it too much. If we give too much attention to it, Sky and the others will start shipping Truelox again."

I nod. "You're right. Okay, so, let's focus on Sky – should we maybe try to go find Bodil? Maybe he thought we were doing one of Bodil's maps, so he went looking for him."

"That's possible," Jason agrees. "Or maybe Bashur or someone – and sometimes Sky gets distracted by sad memories, and he ends up peering into the water at the bottom of the Cliff."

"He's been _so sad_ about the whole E-Ty thing," I say quietly. "I mean, of course, I miss him, too, but not nearly as much as Sky does. Those two were actually really good friends."

"Yeah..," Jason breathes, thinking back to the whole deal. E-Ty used to be our enemy, dead set on murdering Sky and I (and also setting our entire dimension on fire), but near the end of the entire fiasco, he got attached to Sky and became friends with him. Then he jumped off what we now call 'the Cliff' so he could die and 'rid the world of the Evil Dimension,' therefore freeing Sky from the curse of the Red Eyes.

It's complicated.

"Dang it," Jason whispers. "I have a sinking feeling that Sky is in deep trouble and that the author desperately wants to write about it, but she really has to go do something else, because procrastination kept her from finishing this on time!"

I bite my lip. "I guess we'll just have to deal with this filler chapter until next week."

"I guess so."


End file.
